


Chasing Lightning

by midnightflame



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Character Study, Grief/Mourning, Inspired by Art, M/M, Pining, Post-it Notes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-22
Updated: 2018-03-22
Packaged: 2019-04-06 12:54:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14057424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnightflame/pseuds/midnightflame
Summary: Keith scribbles down the mess of his thoughts and emotions in the wake of Kerberos and Shiro's loss, trying to come to terms with this new landscape around him.[Inspired byPaladien's calligraphy work over on twitter]





	Chasing Lightning

**Author's Note:**

> So there was this thread that I was a part of over on twitter and I really just wanted to write something for it. Not only because I have absolutely loved all the calligraphy Ashly has done, but because she is one of the sweetest bits of human in the fandom. <3 I hope you all enjoy this! 
> 
> You can find the twitter inspiration [here](https://twitter.com/paladiens/status/976406259812331520). And as always feel free to come poke me over at my twitter @bymidnightflame.

_I don’t know how to make sense of this._

Stop. 

That’s not right. Well, no. . it is right. Only this isn’t where he wanted to begin. Keith strikes through the sentence with a life-rending cut of black ink. Perhaps that’s the problem with all of this - he doesn’t know how to make right all the wrong that his world has become with one person getting knocked out of his orbit. Some nights, it leaves him feeling weightless like gravity forgot he existed, and so he sits down at his desk and starts to write. As if in writing he can prove that he is still here and out there. . .out there, Shiro still exists too. 

Keith feels that like a stone in his soul, the one you walk over, again and again, always bruising the bottom of your foot. 

_Do you know how much you meant to me? Do you know how much you did for me?_

He starts tapping the point of his pen against the paper, leaving behind little black spots until the right corner becomes a galaxy of midnight stars. It’s a universe in reverse. Space is white, blinding, but still as consuming, and the stars glitter like onyx and dreams, the ones that are born in the very depths of the soul and only find us in the darkest corners of Sleep’s realm. 

Stop. 

His hand goes still, but his thoughts keep rushing forward, a train hardwired for a crash. They keep surging ahead at a breakneck pace, clattering over the tracks and his better reason, and sometimes, it’s like his heart tries to keep pace with it. His heart rate accelerates; his breathing grows shallow. Somewhere in the mix of madness spinning into chaos, his sight starts blurring, and his fingers curl around his pen like it’s the last lifeline he has to this world. 

_Why are you gone? Why are you gone? Whyareyougonewhyareyougonewhyareyougone. . .why are you. . ._

When the moment passes, and he opens his eyes once more, the ink is smeared across the page. Grief, Keith finds, is as voracious as any black hole, swallowing joy as easily as stars. He wipes at his eyes, his nose with his wrist, which he then drags against the side of his thigh. A sniffle punctuates the air. Everything is quiet. 

His mind, this run-down shack, the world outside. All of it is silent. 

Then, he hears his heartbeat, the pulse whispering in his ears. Keith shuts his eyes and tips his head back as he sinks down into the chair. Its wooden legs creak in protest, but it doesn’t collapse. His fingers release their grip over the pen, just enough for the pain to ease from their tips. A smile flashes across the back of his mind. His lips reflexively respond. The ache starts again in his chest, another bruise against too tender flesh. 

_I’m lost without you. . ._

*

Desert nights are deceptive. For a world that burns relentlessly during the day, their nights aren’t just physically cold. They’re soul-numbing.

_I’m going to find you. Or I’m going to try at least. You see, Shiro. . ._

Keith tucks his hands into the pockets of a coat three sizes too big but the warmest thing he’s ever known. Inside of them, his fingers brush against dozens of crumpled edges, the notes crinkling as he pinches at one piece or another and draws them to his palm by the handful like prayers before God. One last thing to hold onto before hope collapses. 

Before him, a fire crackles bright and expressive, its flame jumping, consuming. He watches as the edge of another piece of paper glows radioactive red before falling to ash then turns his gaze to the stars. They’re silver, not black, and the sky is a deep purple-blue, and there are some truths to this world Keith has to accept. 

Maybe in another universe, another time. . .

He pulls out a handful of notes, post-its all colors of the rainbow and each with that neon edge to them that post-its like to trademark. Why settle for sun-gilded yellow when you can run the gamut (though the dark purple was always the hardest to write on, needing the blackest and most indelible of inks to make his thoughts stay put). He tosses that handful into the fire, which chews them down and belches out a sputtering of smoke. Another handful in, and with it his heart clenches around a memory. 

His hand wavers around the next clump of emotional wreckage he had stuffed into the pockets of this jacket. His, and not _his_. Keith swears he can still smell Shiro. His mind reminds him there is nothing but the ash of dreams and memories filling the air right now, clogging his senses.

The next handful goes in with a heavy exhale. 

He feels tired. Too heavy for this world, as if the desert had rooted itself to the bottoms of his feet, made him more of the earth and less of the space above. He still remembers how to fly though, what it meant to have the wind rushing through his hair or his sight set on galaxies beyond all human imagination. Right now though. . .

There is only a strange buzzing in the center of his chest, and he feels like it’s trying to call him home. The oddest sensation really, as he stands here watching his idea of home go up in a blaze even as he’s wrapped itself in the last of its comforts, and still he thinks it’s out there. Home. The place where he belongs, the place one man helped him carve out for himself. Ask Keith, and he’ll tell you about the dirt under his nails and Shiro’s from their efforts to give him a foundation to stand on, the dirt he swears he stills sees because building a life had never been a clean affair. 

He fingers the last note, tucked into the very depths of the right pocket. The fire crackles, the scent of smoke fills his senses, and stars collide millions of light years away.

As he pulls the post-it out, Keith drops his gaze. He slowly unravels it, smoothing out its edges until it looks a little less worn, a little less abused. A smile pulses over his lips, as brief in its life as a meteor shooting across the night sky. 

_It’s killing me. . ._


End file.
